


Ruthie

by NahaFlowers



Category: The Hour
Genre: Brother/Sister Relationship, CUTIEESSS, Gen, Kidfic, SERIOUS ADORABLE ALERT
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-20
Updated: 2013-11-20
Packaged: 2018-01-02 02:57:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1051713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NahaFlowers/pseuds/NahaFlowers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Come on, Freddie,” said Ruthie eagerly, “we’ve got to go and capture the monster in the woods!”<br/>“Coming!” Freddie cried joyously from behind her, his long legs easily catching up with her little ones. “Now, where is this monster? And more importantly, how do we beat it?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ruthie

**Author's Note:**

> I envisage Freddie being about 14 and Ruthie being about 8 in this piece. I can't remember how many years there are canonically between them, but I think it's *about* 6.

“Come on, Freddie,” said Ruthie eagerly, “we’ve got to go and capture the monster in the woods!”

“Coming!” Freddie cried joyously from behind her, his long legs easily catching up with her little ones. “Now, where is this monster? And more importantly, how do we beat it?”

She tugged at his hand to make him bend down, and whispered in his ear. Freddie nodded and straightened up, his eyes shining. He ran to the nearest tree with easy handholds and began clambering up it.

“Freddie!” Ruthie squealed, “What are you doing? We’re meant to throw things at it!”

Freddie had reached a fork in the branches and sat in it, skinny legs swinging over empty air. He looked down at his young companion. “Ah,” he said, “but that would be very imprecise. It might run away before we get it. Plus, we might accidentally his some innocent animals.” 

Ruthie looked very upset at the thought of this.

“But it’s okay!” said Freddie, “Because I’m going to coax it out!”

Ruthie clapped her hands. There was a rustling and the sounds of straining from above as Freddie tried to reach for the next branch, a little too high above for his fourteen year old arms to reach. There was a yelp of shock and all of a sudden Freddie was lying on the ground, among the leaves and the mud, groaning.

Ruthie rushed forward. “Freddie, Freddie, are you all right?”

“Fine,” said Freddie, weakly, dazed.

“Can you get up?” Ruthie edged a little closer, touching his hand lightly.

“Give me a minute,” he said, closing his eyes, willing himself to get up so he could get back to the house and have a warm(ish) bath and avoid questions from Lord and Lady Elms.  
Groaning, his face screwed up and dirty hands pressed into the ground, he tried to push himself up, managing no more than a few inches before he flopped back down with a whimper.

“It’s no good, Ruthie,” he said. Then he saw her distraught face, lip trembling, close to tears. “The monster’s defeated me. You’ll have to go on without me.”  
“How can I, if you can’t? I’m only a girl. And I’m only little.”

“Ruthie, come here.” She obeyed, bending down to meet his eyes, his head slightly raised. “Listen to me. You can defeat this monster. I believe in you. And there’s no _only_ about being a girl. Or little. You know how all those poor people are being killed in the war? With tiny little bullets. Even smaller than you,” he emphasised this by tapping her nose, and Ruthie’s face crinkled up in a smile. Freddie sighed. “You know what, Ruthie? You’re already stronger than me. And cleverer. I mean, you wouldn’t have fallen out of the tree, would you? You would’ve already defeated him, by throwing sticks at it.”

“But you said-” 

“That’s because I’m a coward. I didn’t want to admit to you that my aim was rubbish. But yours is good. You’d probably hit it on the first try. In fact,” he smiled through the pain breaking through the numbness that had paralysed him when he first hit the ground, “why don’t you try it now.”

Ruthie nodded eagerly, eyes sparkling with delight.

“Make sure you pick your weapon carefully,” Freddie whispered in a strained voice, closing his eyes in a feeble attempt to avoid the pain.

Ruthie nodded seriously and set to the task of picking a perfect weapon. Finally, she settled on a small piece of branch: solid and heavy in her hand, with a pointed edge and a rounded one. Perfect.

Ruthie looked to Freddie, but seeing his eyes closed and his brow obviously furrowed in pain, she gritted her teeth, looked up at the tree, took a deep breath and launched the stick up into the higher reaches of the branches.

A loud ‘caw’ came from above, jolting Freddie from his pain-induced semi-conscious state just in time to see a large black crow rising from the branches and heading deeper into the forest as fast as his wings could carry him. Freddie grinned. “Good shot! He won’t be coming back!”

Ruthie smiled delighted, turning to him. She kissed him on the cheek, then whispered in his ear “I’ll go and get mummy for you now.”

Freddie smiled, slipping out of consciousness. “Good girl,” he said as Ruthie ran off in the direction of the house (and away from the monster).


End file.
